


Changes (you don't have to ask me)

by UnCoquelicot



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Arguments, Drama, Fluff, Jealous Zuko (Avatar), Letters, Love Confessions, Mutual Pining, Pining, Quiproquo, Slow Dancing, The Blue Spirit - Freeform, The Blue Spirit hangs out with the Painted Lady, The Painted Lady - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 15:55:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29512125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnCoquelicot/pseuds/UnCoquelicot
Summary: Katara travels the world as the Painted Lady, and the Blue Spirit finds her along the way. Nothing can change her friendship with Zuko, right?
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 135





	Changes (you don't have to ask me)

**Author's Note:**

> So there's a LOT of stuff happening in this one: ballroom dancing (twice!), drama, dates, a jealous Zuko, drama, love letters, drama, a hospital stay for one reckless waterbender, drama, love, fluff, love... All sprinkled with a heavy dose of Blue Spirit / Painted Lady shenanigans.
> 
> I hope you like it!

The night is warm and the moon is high when a soft light appears at a bedroom window, in the capital’s lower district. Katara wishes her healing was less conspicuous, but she can’t stop her water from glowing every time she uses it to mend someone’s wounds. Beads of sweat appear on her forehead as she focuses on calming the man’s fever, but she doesn’t have much time, she’s already hearing someone’s footsteps outside the doors.

With a flick of her wrists Katara gathers her water in her pouch, and flees out the first story window in a flow of veils and mist.

She needs to hit a few more houses before sunrise, but she already feels exhausted. Maybe a little break somewhere would do her good. Bending nonstop is more tiring tonight than it has been during the last two weeks, as it is the new moon. So Katara bunches up her large skirts in her arms and plops down on the slanted tiles of a rooftop overlooking a peaceful street, catching her breath.

She doesn’t get the chance to calm her racing heart very long, as a dark figure springs on the canopy next to her, and she jumps to her feet, already in a half stance with water floating around her, ready to fight. The figure – a man, if his silhouette in the night is any indication – steps back, raising his hands in a gesture of surrender. Katara won’t get fooled so easily, though. Only criminals climb the city’s rooftops at this time of night. Well, and her, of course. As soon as the man starts to lower his hands, she twists her arms in a wide arc and sends water around his legs, tripping him and making him fall backwards. The man grunts at the impact with the roof and tries to get back up, but Katara pounces on him quickly, icing his hands to the tiles, putting her knee on his stomach and her palms on his shoulders, holding him down. He doesn’t try to move away, so Katara takes the opportunity to take a closer look at him. A hard stomach under her knee, a racing pulse she can sense right beneath his skin, a set of – very – muscular shoulders, and… A blue demon mask? _Zuko?_

“Spirits, what are you doing here?” Katara whisper-shouts, getting off of him and helping him up.

“Nice to see you again, Katara,” Zuko grunts, dusting himself off.

“I could’ve hurt you very badly, you know.” Tui, where is her hat? Did it fall when she… Assaulted Zuko?

“Here,” he holds out her hat to her. She takes it wordlessly, putting it back on her head, adjusting her veil as much as she can without a mirror. Spirits, it’s all tangled up now… “Let me,” Zuko tells her, and she stills as he comes in front of her, taking her veil from her hand and fixing it correctly.

“Thanks. Do you mind…?” Katara gestures at his mask, and Zuko grunts again in acknowledgement before taking it off. Seriously, does the man only know to grunt?

She sits back down, patting the tiles next to her in an invitation. Zuko doesn’t make a sound when he settles down beside her, and it makes her wonder if she’ll ever be as stealthy one day. She certainly hopes so.

“So… How did you find me?” Katara asks, hugging her knees.

“I’ve heard rumors, sightings of someone jumping from rooftops to rooftops. And people getting miraculously healthier. Then I thought, no, that can’t be the Painted Lady, my _dear friend Katara_ wouldn’t come here, to my own capital, and not come say hello.” His tone isn’t really accusatory, or teasing. Katara is saddened to understand that, in the year since she last saw him, she forgot how to read him easily. She at least has the decency to blush at his comment.

“Oh, well. You know me. Busy, busy, busy.”

Zuko shoots her an exasperated glare. _That,_ she can read easily.

“I’m… Taking a break. From the tribe. From –” She almost says it, but chokes at the last second.

“Oh. Does he know you’re here?” Of course Zuko doesn’t need her to finish her sentence to guess where she was going with it.

“No. No one does. Well, except for you, now. I stopped in a few cities but none needs the Painted Lady as badly as the capital.”

“How long are you planning on disappearing?”

“Not that long, I’m –” Katara thinks of his words. “I wrote them a note, you know. I didn’t just disappear. That’s Aang’s way, not mine.” Her tone is biting and she thinks, guiltily, _I shouldn’t talk about him this way,_ but then remembers who she is talking to, and how mad she is anyway.

“So you held out a year.”

“What?” Katara turns to look at him, but his eyes are set on the stars.

“You and Aang – you held out a year. As a couple. I would’ve thought you would have broken up with him sooner,” he casually observes. A year, huh. That’s true, a year since the tea party, at Iroh’s shop. The last time they were all together.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch, Zuko.” She puts her hand on his and feels him stiffen. “I should’ve told you I was coming here, I… I don’t know, I guess I just wanted some alone time.”

“Oh. I’m – I can go, if you want to stay alone, I –”

“No, no, it’s fine. We can be alone together.”

Zuko seems to relax considerably and even sends a small smile her way. Katara forgets about the other houses she was supposed to visit tonight, and they talk until sunrise. Zuko tells her of Mai finally breaking things off with him and running to the Kyoshi Warriors – to Ty Lee – a few months ago. She tells him of the repairs of her tribe, of the northerners coming to help them build a new village, of her newly felt uselessness with the reconstruction. He tells her of politics, of the state of his city and country, and how he misses them all tremendously. She hugs him and promises to come visit more often, now that they don’t need her much in the South Pole. And like that, their easy camaraderie is back.

“So,” Katara tells him as they get up, preparing to part ways. “I’m staying at the Jade Dragon Inn, on the main street. Tomorrow, I’m going back out here to do some more healing.”

Zuko seems to get where’s she’s getting at, and nods. “I’ll come get you.” And Katara smiles at him before jumping off the roof.

She was planning on staying just a few more nights and then move on to other parts of the country, then the Earth Kingdom, but in the end she stays long enough for the summer to turn into fall. Almost every night during her stay, the Blue Spirit and Painted Lady hit the town, fighting criminals and healing sick people. Katara only leaves for other Fire Nation towns when she sees the toll it’s taking on Zuko, not having his days free to recover from his nights, and even if he insists he is fine with their routine, she tells him goodbye on the same rooftop they met that first night.

******

She doesn’t see Zuko before next spring, at the first international trade summit, in Ba Sing Se. At least, this time, they kept in touch in her absence: Katara came back to her tribe early in the winter to see a letter from the Fire Nation waiting for her.

The reconstruction is going well, and the northern waterbenders did a wonderful job in her absence. She can’t afford to be bitter about that, it was her choice to leave. But at least, when she comes back, Aang isn’t there anymore and she can focus on helping as much as she can with what still needs to be done until the moment they have to leave for Ba Sing Se.

This time, when she leaves the tribe, it is with her whole family and a delegation of Water Tribe ambassadors.

When they meet again, in the Earth King’s palace, her eyes trace the crowd to find Zuko looking at her from the other side of the room. He nods at her with a slight smile, and she bows mockingly.

“So,” she begins, once they both crossed the room and met halfway in the middle of the parting crowd.

“So.” His smile is teasing, and there is pink dusting his cheeks. Katara doesn’t get the chance to wonder about that, before Zuko says, “I know we’re here for only a few days, but I kind of miss our… Nightly excursions.”

The hand he passes at the back of his head is a symbol of his nervousness, and Katara finds it laughable that he could think she wouldn’t want to get back to their crime-fighting-and-also-healing-and-bringing-food duo, and almost tells him so, but takes pity on his nerves and smiles. “I brought my hat and veils.”

Zuko brightens. “I’ll come get you tonight.” He turns around, greeting other dignitaries, and Katara ponders on the strange warmth his parting words provoked in her chest.

They don’t talk much at the welcoming banquet, but Katara knows they’ll have the next few nights to catch up properly. That night, she retires early to her room and starts applying her trade mark red paint on her face, her heart racing and a smile gracing her features. She’s putting her hat in place when she hears a faint knock at her bedroom window.

“My, oh my, if it isn’t the mighty Blue Spirit, come to a fair maiden’s window in the middle of the night,” she teases as she steps out on the balcony.

She hears his breathy laugh, muffled by his mask, and Zuko bows deeply. “My Lady, if I may bask in your company in this fine evening.”

“You may.”

Together they step over her balcony railing and sneak out of the compound, targeting the lower ring. In the year and a half since the end of the war, the Earth King, with Toph’s help, has started bringing down the walls in an effort to stop dividing the city by class. Having no gigantic walls between them and their destination makes their sneaking around easier, but Katara and Zuko both know the outer limits of the city are still home to the poorest citizens, the ones they can help the most.

Surprisingly enough, it’s in the former upper ring that their first mission kicks off.

A group of five thugs are advancing on a scared woman, clutching her bag to her chest and begging them to leave her alone, when Zuko jumps off the roof and faces them.

“ _The Blue Spirit_ ,” one of them yells.

“I thought he was in the Fire Nation,” his beefy friend tells the others.

Katara drops down behind him and helps the woman up as Zuko unsheathes his dao swords. “Are you hurt?” She waits for the woman to shake her head no before telling her to go home and turning around to help Zuko.

Just in time, as one of the thugs turns out to be an earthbender and bends a boulder the size of her head in Zuko’s chest, sending him sprawling on the ground, a few paces back.

Katara lets out an angry growl and, in a wide arc of her arms, gathers moisture from all around them and sends it to the assailant’s head with such force that he flies into a wall and doesn’t get up again. The moon is nearly full, and she can feel the man’s pulse going strong, he is just knocked unconscious. A shiver runs up Katara’s spine at the thought of what she almost did, but doesn’t have the time to ponder on it long before the other four thugs start to surround her. She barely has time to bend her water back into a whip before one of them attacks her from behind, tackling her to the ground.

She hits the pavement with a huff, her breath rushing out of her lungs as the man’s weight settles on her back. Not for long, though, as the sound of swords flying rings out in her ears and Zuko pushes the man off of her, knocking him out with the hilt of his dao.

Katara gets back up quickly, biting back a groan at the pain in her ribcage and sends icicles flying, pinning down two of the remaining criminals. The last one yells in fear and tries to run away, but Zuko is fast as he runs towards him and slices his calf with his sword, making him fall and crash into trashcans.

The noise alerts neighbors, some of them looking out their windows, and Katara and Zuko silently exit the area before guards can show up, running to a nearby rooftop and sprawling out on it, breathing hard.

“Wow, that was…” Katara begins, her breath too short for her to finish her sentence.

“Yeah.” Zuko takes off his mask and turns his head towards her, watching her with a scowl. “That guy didn’t hurt you, right? You’re okay?”

“Yes, Zuko, I’m okay. I just had the air knocked out of me for a sec, nothing major. How about you? That boulder has _got_ to have bruised a few ribs.” Katara doesn’t wait for him to deny anything, instead sitting back up and grabbing the hem of his tunic, intent on checking for injuries.

Zuko squirms away from her, blushing madly, and bats her hands away. “No, no, I’m fine Katara, don’t –”

But the waterbender is stubborn and she manages to rise his shirt up above his ribs. “Shit, it’s going to hurt, I can already tell,” she diagnoses. Zuko stills as she brings her hands on his sides, prodding for a cracked rib or two. “Nothing is broken, at least, but let me just –”

Bringing water up, the glow illuminates the paleness of his skin as she passes her healing hands on his torso, checking if she missed anything. The shirt rises up some more and the edges of a very familiar scar appear to her view. She freezes at the sight. “Really, Katara, I’m good.” Zuko takes her hand in his, and the water falls on the rooftop’s tiles and his pants. If she thought his skin was warm to the touch, it is nothing compared to the heat of his fingers on hers. Or maybe it is her who has cold skin?

Katara looks up at him and notices how close their faces are. With her leaning above him, their hands joined together over his heart and their noses almost touching, she can’t even begin to wonder what the scene must look like to a passerby. Thankfully, there can be no passerby, as they are currently on a rooftop. In Ba Sing Se. In their Blue Spirit and Painted Lady gear. Katara suddenly remembers why they are here and clears her throat, leaning back on her knees.

Zuko stays down a few seconds more and she hears him let out a sigh before sitting up.

Katara doesn’t want to think about the tingling feeling in her fingers, where Zuko grabbed her, so she asks, “One of the guys, earlier – he said he thought the Blue Spirit was in the Fire Nation… Aren’t you worried people might start linking the Blue Spirit’s position to yours?”

“I, erh… Planted some false information about the Blue Spirit’s whereabouts back in the Fire Nation to throw people off my trail,” he admitted. “Right now I should be rumored to be seen in Shuhon Island.”

“Brilliant. Maybe I should do the same with the Painted Lady,” Katara says, but remembers the Painted Lady isn’t as famous as her counterpart, especially in the Earth Kingdom.

They sit in silence for a few minutes before taking off again. Their first night in the Earth Kingdom is exhausting but bountiful, as they manage to stop two more crimes, to heal five cases of fever and three broken bones, and to distribute food to a few starving households.

******

The five days of the summit pass in a blur. Katara feels as much drained as energized from their nights out, and she thinks Zuko feels the same, if his tired smiles in her direction are any indication.

She notices how closer they both get to each other, how effortlessly casual they are with their secret identities and their nights out, how the secrecy apparently strengthens their friendship. Zuko seems more relaxed around her, he smiles more and it makes her incredibly happy to enjoy this special closeness with him. Their friends notice too, of course. She has to avoid certain topics of discussion in order to keep their Blue Spirit and Painted Lady personas secret, but it doesn’t keep Aang from sending her hurt looks when she laughs with Zuko, or Suki and Sokka from smirking when Katara touches Zuko casually.

It is the first time she spends this much time around Aang in months, and Katara thought he would have moved on – she has, and easily, so why not him? – but apparently her close friendship with Zuko disturbs him. Maybe she should talk to him, see where he is at, feelings wise, see if they can become friends again.

On the last day, they have an afternoon free of meetings and Sokka, Toph, Suki and Aang take the opportunity to go stroll around the city. Katara and Zuko stay behind, taking the warm spring sun in the palace’s garden – Aang strikes her again with the puppy polar-dog eyes on his way out.

“I’m going to miss this,” Katara tells him. “The sun, the warmth, the rooftops…”

“You know, we have sun, warmth and rooftops in the Fire Nation,” Zuko says, and Katara raises an eyebrow.

“Fire Lord Zuko, are you asking me to come back to the Fire Nation with you?” She asks with a smirk.

“ _No!”_ Red suits him fine, Katara thinks, but never as fine as when it is spread out on his cheeks. “I just – I meant that if you wanted, you know, to come see me sometime soon, I wouldn’t… Be opposed… To you coming – visiting – staying – I mean…”

Katara can’t help the laugh bubbling up from her chest. She really loves seeing the almighty Fire Lord Zuko being all awkward on her account. Deciding to end his torture here, she lays her hand on top of his forearm – _that_ makes him stop blubbering – and tells him, “I wouldn’t be opposed either. But the South Pole is expanding, and they will need me for a while.”

Zuko looks disappointed and she tries not to read too much into it. “I thought the northerners were enough help?”

“I guess I just… Feel weird, seeing my home getting reconstructed and enhanced without me there, it’s –”

“I get it, Katara. Don’t worry.” Zuko’s smile is strained, but she knows he understands.

The truth is, she really _would_ like to go back to the Fire Nation with him, instead of heading back south with her family. The thought makes her feel uneasy, guilty almost, but she has seen the influence the Painted Lady has had on the Fire Nation’s citizens, and she knows she can be as useful there as in the South Pole, if not more.

But she also knows that, if Zuko’s country needs her help, the two Water Tribes and the Earth Kingdom too; be it in her capacity as Painted Lady, ambassador or simply Katara, southern waterbender. She wants to be selfish, and some part of her wonders why her selfishness wants to bring her to Zuko’s side, but the helper, the _healer_ in her wants and needs to go back to the south. And maybe scout the Earth Kingdom too.

“I’ll probably head to the Earth Kingdom when the reparations are over,” she thinks aloud. “It’s a big country, they probably need the Painted Lady a lot, over there.”

The flash of hurt passing over Zuko’s features doesn’t go unnoticed, but Katara steels herself in her decision. She has stayed in the Fire Nation more than anywhere else in the past year, and the need to help others is so deeply ingrained in her that she can’t fathom turning her back on an entire country just because one of her friends doesn’t live there.

“They will be lucky to have you,” Zuko says somberly.

“Yeah, well… I think I want to follow Aang’s example, be useful everywhere people need me, you know?”

“I didn’t know you had such wanderlust. Maybe you should see if _Aang_ can take you on his bison and follow him around some more.” His tone is biting and he refuses to meet her eyes, instead looking over the garden.

Anger, hot and boiling and unwelcome, scalds her chest. “What’s with you? Are you mad at me or something? I’m just informing you of my plans – no, not even plans, just general ideas for the immediate future – and you go off on me,” she squeaks out.

“Sounds like your _plans_ don’t include m – the Fire Nation in it, that’s all.” He tries to sound casual, but she sees the annoyance on his face, the red in his cheeks, the furrowed brow.

Katara wants to remind him, to yell at him that she, in fact, has been to the Fire Nation more than anywhere else in the past year, that she forwent helping her own tribe in its reconstruction for _months_ to help _his country._ So she does exactly that. And of course, _of course,_ Zuko takes it the wrong way.

In the end, there is a lot of yelling, smoke coming out from Zuko’s closed fists, tea in their cups sloshing and spilling. What she remembers from their discussion – not a discussion, a fight, really – is bits and pieces of _I thought we were a duo,_ and _I can’t believe you would ask me to turn my back on Earth Kingdom people,_ and _You know what, don’t bother writing._

How did it go so wrong?

She wants to make him see, to make him understand that she will always be there for him even if she doesn’t prioritize the Fire Nation for now, she wants to stop fighting, to shake him and stop feeling the fracture in their relationship grow and grow until they can’t go back to their easy friendship anymore.

“Zuko, I…” He doesn’t let her apologize for her part before he gets up and leaves.

******

Katara doesn’t see him for eight months after that. What a waste of friendship, a waste of promises, a waste of time. There are no letters, and Katara moves around too much to be traceable anyway.

She thinks about writing Zuko during her travels, several times. Starting a missive with descriptions of what she saw or heard today, what town she is hitting next, how she helps people as the Painted Lady, but also as just Katara. Of course she feels badly about having left him in lousy terms. But she doesn’t regret her decision, not once. During her last year, she has overseen the official end of her tribe’s reconstruction, she has helped a lot of Earth Kingdom small towns, she even has started a program for healers in Omashu with King Bumi. And she has become friends with Aang again. Damn it, she really missed him.

So no, Katara doesn’t regret a thing. But she thinks it is maybe time to go to the Fire Nation and take her business there. To mend what she thinks she tore apart when she fought with Zuko.

This is how she finds herself on a Water Tribe boat, hitching a ride with northern and southern diplomats, wringing her hands in her lap and biting her lip. She hasn’t told anyone she is going to the Fire Nation for the winter, apart from her family, and she hopes it is not a rash decision. What if Zuko doesn’t want to see her? What if he is away on business? What if she has nothing to do there, no one to help?

She thinks about his reaction, how they grew closer and he seemed to assume she would come see him before helping the Earth Kingdom. Then she gets irritated because he just wants her to abandon her principles to… What? Lounge in the palace with him? But no, that’s not it. She knows Zuko like the back of her hand; he would never assume she would be at his disposition whenever he likes. _That_ makes her wonder about his reaction to her plans, about the hurt look he gave her before leaving the Earth King’s garden. And then she mainly hopes he isn’t resentful of her, or sad, or furious with her. And she is scared of what she missed while she was away, what if something bad came up? What if Zuko has suffered, this past year, and she didn’t know about it because she was too busy travelling and being mad at him?

So yeah. Katara isn’t in the best state of mind.

Taking a deep breath and centering herself, she closes her eyes and inhales the salty sea air, feeling wind in her hair and water in her pulse.

It is not before a few hours that her ship accosts the Fire Nation’s capital’s shores. The docks are just like she remembers them, just like when she first disembarked here anonymously to assume the identity of the Painted Lady after breaking up with Aang. She is glad to be friends again with the airbender, but she thinks she will never tell him of her nightly rooftops strolls. It is her concern, and Zuko’s, and she doesn’t feel like sharing it with the boy who has all of the nations’ burdens on his shoulders already.

Lost in thoughts about Aang while walking up the pier, she almost runs into the Fire Lord.

“ _Zuko!_ Hi.” Katara brushes herself up, rearranging her windswept hair, not meeting his eyes.

“Katara… What – What are you doing here?”

“I hitched a ride. What are _you_ doing here?”

“I’m supposed to welcome the diplomats, you know, seeing as I am the Fire Lord and everything…” He smiles slyly at her, and she feels the heat of the Fire Nation sun beating down on her suddenly.

So at least he doesn’t seem mad at her anymore. But they don’t really have the time to discuss anything. They are standing on the docks and the dignitaries are watching them, waiting to be, as Zuko put it, welcomed.

“So I’ll, huh, see you around?” She asks lamely.

“You’re not… Coming to the palace?” His expression is distressed for a moment, and she almost laughs as relief floods her.

“ _Yes!_ I mean, yes, of course, if you want me to. I’ll come. I just have some more stuff to go get from the boat.”

Heat crawls on her cheeks as the implication of what she just said dawns on her, and _of course_ Zuko smirks. “You have more bags? Planning on staying here long?”

Instead of getting flustered – which is incredibly hard to do with a flushed face – she squares her shoulders, looks him in the eye and simply says, “Yes.”

This time, it is his turn to blush.

The diplomats are finally ushered into palanquins and Zuko greets them all one by one, bowing deeply at the waist. He doesn’t seem angry with her surprise visit, nor with the fact that she is planning to stay a while in his city. Their months apart must have smoothed things over for them both, but she knows they will have to discuss this once she is settled in the palace.

Katara looks at the scene from the deck of the ship, shouldering her packs, and smiles. Maybe she worried for nothing. Maybe being here will be good.

******

Zuko takes her to his study so they can talk in private and catch up properly. He’ll have to make an apparition later to a banquet organized for the diplomats, but they have time before that.

“Do you… You’re not obligated to come to the dinner, if you don’t want to, but would you accompany me?” He blushes again and Katara wonders how she never caught the fact that his alabaster skin lets through so many emotions.

“Sure, I won’t let you have all the fun. And it’s my people, I can help you navigate the weirdness of Master Panuk or keep Lady Yura away from the wine.”

Zuko laughs and mumbles something Katara doesn’t quite catch.

“I’m sorry, what was that?” She asks innocently.

“I said, I missed you. There.” He looks sullen but she knows it’s just for show.

Katara feels heat creep up her face when she tells him she missed him too.

“I’m sorry I haven’t kept in touch this past year,” she admits. “I wanted to write you several times, I even picked up the pen once or twice, starting a letter, but…”

“I get it. I’m sorry too, you know. About how we left things off last time, I shouldn’t have… I shouldn’t have made you feel badly about not coming here.” Zuko leans back against his desk, crossing his arms and grabbing his elbows. “I instantly knew it was wrong, but I just – I wanted to continue our expeditions and I guess I was scared that stopping them for a while would be… I don’t know, the end of this, I think.”

“Thank you. And I’m sorry for yelling at you,” she tells him with a smile.

“ _I’m_ sorry for yelling.”

“Okay then, we’re both sorry. Do we accept each other’s apology?” She teases.

They shake hands and chant _Aye-aye_ before bursting out laughing.

_Is it really that simple?_ Katara wonders as she catches up with her friend. _Did we really just erase a year of not talking, a whole fight, with a joke and a handshake?_ She laughs and realizes, _yes, we did. What idiots._

They catch up for what feels like hours; Katara tells him of her exploits as the Painted Lady and he explains that he knows a lot of it already. She has made a name for herself as a spirit in the Earth Kingdom, and news of her healing and crime-fighting has come back to the Fire Nation. Zuko goes on and on about what he heard, how she managed to subdue some ex war-lords into helping the towns they were bullying, how she fed an entire city in one night, how she healed the prince of the Makapu province and he wouldn’t shut up about her for weeks. “Somebody has a crush,” he mocks.

“I’m flattered you kept tabs so dutifully on me,” she mocks back.

That shuts him up.

“It’s not the end, you know. Of us.” Katara hears the double-entendre of her words – and thinks Zuko does too if his raised eyebrow is any indication. “I mean, I’m here now. I came here to maybe help during the day, like I did in Omashu with the healers’ program, but we can go out some nights. If you wanted.”

“I want to,” he says almost too fast. “I really like going out with you. I mean – You know.”

She knows, and just like that, a deal is made. They will suffer through the banquet together tonight, and tomorrow evening they’ll sneak out and resume their nightly activities together.

******

After a week in the Fire Nation, Katara finds a day job in the Caldera’s firebending school. Spending so many months with other benders during the war made her aware of the differences between the practice of all the elements, and talking with Iroh during her visits to Ba Sing Se has helped her realize how well bending styles can mix together. It is not without counting on the numerous times she caught Zuko firebend with waterbending moves in the past years.

So yes, a waterbender in a firebending school is a first, but she assists during the lessons and helps students and masters invent new moves and get stronger by studying her fighting style. At first she wanted a job at the hospital, Spirits know they need all the healers they can get; but it would have meant giving up her Painted Lady persona. She can’t have people linking the healing spirit’s ways with Katara of the Southern Water Tribe, healer at the Caldera hospital.

She and Zuko go out every few nights, not wanting to exhaust themselves seeing as they have responsibilities to attend to during the day. Katara finds herself looking forward to these nights more and more often, and even daydreams during her lessons at the school. _I can’t wait to show this move to Zuko,_ or _I have to finish classes early today if we’re going on a food raid._

On her third week in the Fire Nation, Katara doesn’t remember how many days she was supposed to stay here, and Zuko gifts her a collections of stories about the Blue Spirit and the Painted Lady.

She’s holed up in his study one night – as she often finds herself these days, when she wants some peace and quiet; Zuko’s office is comfortable and she likes the smell – when she opens the book of legends and stumbles on a story with both spirits’ names in the title.

“ _The Painted Lady and Blue Spirit’s parting gifts_ , huh,” she mumbles to herself. “I had no idea they knew each other in some of the legends.”

The story is fascinating, it speaks of their alter-egos’ meeting, of their ways of helping some villages in the Fire Nation – not unlike her and Zuko’s ways – and of their powers. In this legend, the Painted Lady can not only heal, but read people’s auras and thoughts. And the Blue Spirit can render himself invisible. Katara smirks at that. Zuko can’t turn invisible, but he can be pretty stealthy when he wants to, so that part is spot on.

She reads on until the part where the Blue Spirit and the Painted Lady seal their intertwined destiny with a kiss of true love. “That’s ridiculous!” Her stomach flips as she reads the lines, and she slams the book on the desk. “ _Zuko and I aren’t in love!_ ”

“We’re not? Awh that’s unfortunate.” Zuko’s voice is loud in her left hear and his breath his hot on her neck when she jumps, her heart racing. He laughs at her reaction and eyes the book carefully. “So I take it you read the part about our alter-egos being in love.”

“Damn it, Zuko, don’t _sneak up on people like that!_ ”

“Actually, you’re in my study so I can do what I please.” He has the audacity to laugh again at her shocked face, and goes to sit behind his desk, in his previously occupied – by her – chair.

She huffs and sits directly on his desk, disturbing his carefully arranged scrolls and ink pots. “Wanna go out tonight?”

“Like, on a date?” Zuko teases her. His smirk is sly, but she notices his flushed cheeks nonetheless.

“Ha! You’re funny!” The sarcastic words taste bitter in her mouth; she doesn’t want to linger on _that._ “No but really, we haven’t been out in two nights. I think the lower district misses us.”

So, they do exactly that. But tonight, Katara isn’t focused. She can’t help but rethink and dwell on what she read in the Blue Spirit and Painted Lady collection. Any day, the fact that their alter-egos share some sort of romantic relationship would have made her laugh. It would certainly _not_ have rattled her like it does tonight.

In love. The Painted Lady and the Blue Spirit are in love.

And as she watches Zuko jump from roof to roof in his silent persona, as she discreetly follows him in a cloud of mist, the only things she can remember are those lines in that damned book.

And as Zuko lowers himself to the ground to fight off a bunch of armed thieves, as she takes care of the ones that managed to climb on the canopy, all she can think of is their alter-egos kissing.

And as Zuko climbs back up on the rooftop, as one of the thieves takes his long knife and plunges it in her stomach as she is lifting her arms up to bend, all she can see is blue and red mixed together.

“ _KATARA,_ ” she hears Zuko scream. It is a gut-wrenching, panicked, heart breaking scream but all she can think about is the pain erupting from her midsection.

Katara can only cradle her bleeding stomach as she staggers on the edge of the roof, only to meet emptiness and feel her heart rise up in her throat as she starts falling backward. Another scream comes from somewhere above her, and she falls, falls, falls. Her eyes close and she loses consciousness before hitting the ground.

******

“So they know?” The feel of the cold water is a blessing against her wound, as it hurts too much still for her to sit up. Her head is starting to feel better, at least.

“Yes, I’m sorry, they saw your Painted Lady disguise. They didn’t ask questions, and they’re bound by professional secrecy, but…”

“Zuko, it’s okay, you did what you had to do by bringing me here. At least they didn’t see your mask. Where did you even stash it by the way?”

Zuko passes his hands in his tousled hair, sighing from his seat near her hospital bed. “I honestly don’t remember. I was in a panic, I think I hid it on some rooftop somewhere near here… They’ll probably make the connection anyway, you know. The Blue Spirit hangs out with the Painted Lady, everybody knows that; and last night _I_ came in here carrying you, _I_ was dressed in all black, it’s not very inconspicuous.”

Katara pauses in her healing to put her hand on his. “It’s okay, I think these doctors respect their Fire Lord too much too accuse him of being the Blue Spirit. And we’ll look for your mask later.”

But that doesn’t seem to calm him down. Zuko rushes to his feet and starts pacing the room, his robes – he managed to go back to the palace, get properly dressed and snatch some paperwork to do at her bedside while she was healing her head earlier – swishing behind him at every turn. “I’m just… You were unconscious for _hours_ Katara. I really like going out at night with you but not if it’s going to put you in this much danger.”

“What? _No!_ Zuko, I’m fine, look –” she gestures to her uncovered stomach. “It’s healing just fine.”

“It’s not the point, you shouldn’t have gotten hurt _in the first place!”_ He’s spiraling, she can see it, but she can’t move to get him to stop walking up and down her hospital room. “It’s my fault, I should have been up there with you instead of down on the ground, I should have… I should have killed that fucking bastard when I had the chance, I –”

“ _Zuko._ ” He raises crazed, tired eyes at her interruption. “It was entirely my fault. I wasn’t focused and I didn’t see the knife in time.”

“Don’t –”

“I’m not blaming myself. It’s just the truth. I was thinking about – About stuff. _Argh,_ I feel so _stupid!_ I can’t be all distracted when I’m in a fight, what is wrong with me?” Her outburst only brings her physical pain, and she winces hard, clutching her stomach.

Zuko immediately comes back to his seat, stroking her forearm with one hand and brushing her hair back with the other. Once she can breathe again, Katara leans back down on her pillow and resumes her healing. “What… What were you thinking about?” She barely hears him over the pulsing in her ears and the quietness of his voice.

“I… Just stuff, okay? Nothing important.” Katara feels her heart beating faster, and refuses to meet Zuko’s eyes as he tries to look at her face.

“It must have been important enough for you to get distracted and get stabbed,” he states plainly.

“It’s stupid.”

“Try me.”

“I was thinking about the stuff between the Painted Lady and the Blue Spirit, okay? I don’t know why it distracted me like that, I –”

“I do.” Zuko flushes red, visibly embarrassed. “I mean, I get it.”

Katara can only lock her gaze on his, trying to understand what he’s conveying with those confusing words, until a knock at the door interrupts her thoughts.

“ _Kuzon!_ Hi, come on in,” Katara tells the visitor with a smile; she sits up in spite of the pain. She can still feel Zuko’s burning gaze on her as she greets her young colleague from the firebending school.

“You didn’t come in this morning, and a palace messenger told us you were in the hospital. I – Is everything alright?”

Zuko coughs from his corner, and Kuzon’s eyes bulge out. The young man immediately bends down in a low bow, apologizing for not having seen the Fire Lord sooner. Katara laughs and introduces them. “I’m sorry, Zuko, this is Kuzon. He’s my first friend at work. Kuzon, you already know Fire Lord Zuko.”

Zuko sizes the man up and down and curls his lips in a smirk. “Kuzon, that’s… A common name,” he ends lamely. Katara wants to slap her hand on her forehead but doesn’t want to seem rude in front of her newest friend.

Kuzon gives her flowers and Katara can’t help but smile softly as she smells them. He brings another chair up next to her bed and they start chatting up casually. She reassures him about her injury, she’ll be fit to come back to the school tomorrow; he compliments her on her healing and she feels herself starting to blush. All this time, Zuko watches them silently from his own seat, not partaking in their conversation once.

When Kuzon announces that he has to go back to the school for his next firebending lesson, he takes Katara’s hand in his and wishes her a quick recovery, and to return to them soon. He bows again to Zuko and, as he leaves, Katara stares after him, at the doors he exited through and smiles fondly. Kuzon is always nice to her at school, a bit shy but fun and thoughtful.

“You never mentioned him before.” Zuko’s dry words startle her from her contemplation.

“No, I guess I didn’t. He’s a really good guy, he kind of reminds me of Aang, you know? But coming here, rushing between his lessons, that’s… Well, it’s really nice, that’s all.” Her face still feels hot. When Zuko doesn’t answer, she tries to coax him out of his silence by picking up their conversation from earlier. “So about what you said, before. About the Painted Lady and the Blue Spirit, what did you mean, you _get it_?” Suddenly nervous, she starts playing with some of the flowers Kuzon gave her, and only looks up at him when the silence stretches on for too long. “Zuko?”

He looks pained when he watches her fingers play with the leaves in her grasp. “I meant – I get why you were distracted, it’s… It’s a ridiculous notion. Them. Together.”

Katara tries not to feel her heart plummet down into her socks. “Oh. You – You think so?”

“Yeah.” Zuko looks at the door Kuzon left through. “Absolutely foolish.”

******

Katara leaves the hospital in the evening, having completely healed herself – and rendered useless the stitching work the doctors have done on her stomach. Zuko is not here to accompany her back to the palace; after Kuzon’s visit he tidies his paperwork and declares he’ll be more efficient working in his study, so if Katara doesn’t need him, he’ll be going.

She doesn’t think much of it until a few days later, when she notices she hasn’t seen Zuko much since she got out of the hospital, not even for nightly expeditions. He doesn’t seem to be avoiding her completely per se, they still spend most of their meals together, but always surrounded by a certain number of dignitaries, nobles, diplomats… When she has gotten used to dining alone with him most of the time. He gets up too early to train in the morning, so she can’t catch him at breakfast before going to her school, and he excuses himself early every night, claiming he has work to do, always more work.

Katara knows he isn’t lying; he _is_ the Fire Lord, he’ll always have business to attend to, paperwork to fill, letters to write and proposals to review. But she can’t help but feel like he is using his work as an excuse to not spend alone time with her, and if at first it confuses her, then saddens her, now it just makes her mad.

So, he doesn’t want to see her? Fine. She has other people to see, like Kuzon, or even Iroh. Zuko’s uncle just arrived from Ba Sing Se to help organize the palace’s end of the year party. So Katara uses the energy she could spend being angry after her friend to instead help Iroh with the organization, when she is not working.

And at night, when she can’t sleep, she goes out as the Painted Lady.

She was doing it alone, before Zuko came barreling back into her life. She can do this by herself once more. She has spent enough time exploring the city with and without him to know her way around.

So after a few days out of the hospital, a few days of Zuko ignoring her, a few days of secretly repairing her Painted Lady dress, a few days of organizing a party with Iroh and spending time with Kuzon, she just… Jumps out of her window one night and doesn’t come back until morning.

That night, it rains hard on the capital, and Katara curses the Fire Nation winters. She likes rain as much as the next waterbender, but it doesn’t make her task easy, and she almost slips and falls off rooftops three or four times. She has no desire to repeat her fall from last time – her head has throbbed for _hours_ even with her healing – so she threads carefully, painfully slowly, over the streets of the lower districts.

She manages to mend four injuries, to distribute food to a dozen households, to visit one orphanage and heal several sick children, and to fight off one bully. All in all, a pretty good night, for not having the Blue Spirit with her.

_But I don’t need him_. She didn’t need him before, so why would she want him with her now?

When she slips back into her room, right before dawn, Zuko is here, asleep on one of her armchairs. Katara has to do a double take. What in Tui’s name is he even doing here? She pushes back her hat and veil and kneels next to him, before gently shaking his shoulder.

“Zuko.”

He blinks slowly back to wakefulness, and at first doesn’t seem to remember where he is or with whom, because he just looks at her fondly and shoots her a lazy smile that has her stomach doing a summersault.

“Katara?” His barely-awake voice is deeper and hoarser than she is used to, and hearing her name in that tone makes something clench in her belly.

“You’re in my room, it is dawn – Zuko what are you doing here?”

“Oh, I…” Zuko sits up suddenly, his eyes more alert now. “I came to see you last night, and you weren’t here so I waited for you, I… Must have fallen asleep. Did you just get back now?”

As mad as Katara may have been, she feels her anger drain away at seeing him here, having waited for her all night long. “Oh but your timing is really terrible, the only night I go out and you decide to come visit me,” she laughs lightly.

“Where were you?” All sleepiness is gone from his features now, and he looks her over with a pissed off look in his eyes. “You were _out_ , weren’t you? As the Painted Lady?”

“Yes,” Katara answers calmly. She gets up and starts peeling off the layers of her costume, hanging her hat and veils by her bed.

“And you didn’t think to ask me to come?” He is up too, now, and his fists are clenched.

She feels a spark of anger coming back to her but is too tired to start fighting now, so she just sighs and tells him, “You were busy. And anyway, I used to do this alone before, remember?”

Katara can see he already looks wound up, so she doesn’t want to add that she _would_ have called for him, if he hadn’t spent these last days avoiding her. After an entire night of bending and healing, all she wants is to sleep. So instead of arguing, she slips under her covers, letting him know he can let himself out now.

“I – Uncle wanted me to give you this.” Zuko shuffles to her bedside and lays down a small stack of cards on her nightstand. “They’re invitations, for the end of the year party. You can give them out to who you want.” So _that_ is why he came to her room. Of course it wasn’t to talk to her, or to apologize for being so absent.

“Thanks.” Her voice is muffled by the sheets she put over her head. “If you don’t have anything more to tell me, I’d like to sleep now, please.”

She doesn’t look at him but hears him shift on his feet for almost a minute, let out a sigh and turn around. She’s almost asleep by the time her door clicks shut behind him.

******

Katara invites Kuzon. She would have given out more invitations, but the other teachers from the school already have plans with their families, and she doesn’t think they would want to bring their children to the palace for a formal party.

Fortunately, Kuzon is available and Katara feels thankful, because she hasn’t addressed a word to Zuko since he came to her room, and she doesn’t want to spend the entire party alone.

They don’t celebrate the new year much, in the poles; the winter solstice is ceremony enough for them, and it has come and gone a few days ago. As much as Katara would have liked to be in the South Pole for the celebration, she can’t leave her job just like that. So she plans to enjoy the end of the year party as much as she can, since it will be the only winter celebration she will get to go to for now. Maybe she will get to go to the Earth Kingdom’s new year, set in a few weeks. She fondly remembers Sokka wondering why Toph and Suki’s nation celebrates the new year on another day than the Fire Nation, but, _Hey, I’m not complaining, it’s one more reason to get drunk and see fireworks,_ he said while waving a bottle of sake around.

But Sokka, Aang, Toph and Suki won’t be there for the palace’s party, so Kuzon is the next best thing.

Katara looks back at her reflection in the huge mirror set in her bedroom, and smoothes down her skirts. Iroh asked the palace’s tailor to make her a dress for the celebration, and as much as Katara protested, at first, she has to admit that she is glad for the old man’s persistence.

The hanfu is long, going down to her feet, and made of a material so light and silky that she feels like water itself, wearing it. The blues and silvers help sell the illusion of a river goddess, and the beads representing a school of fish on her long sleeves reflect the light whenever she turns. To her surprise, she finds silvery hairpins with sapphire crescent moons carved in them in her vanity’s drawer; the two pins are exquisite and she can’t help but put them in her hair, even if she has no idea where they came from or if it belongs to someone else.

Satisfied with her reflection, Katara walks down to the main entrance to wait for Kuzon. When he arrives and sees her, his eyes bulge out of his head and he says, “Wow. You sure clean up nicely, Katara.”

She’s sure a slight blush is adorning her cheeks, by now, and she returns the compliment. They walk arm in arm to the ballroom and Katara fondly rolls her eyes as Kuzon whistles appreciatively at the fancy decoration.

The party has been going on for almost an hour when Zuko is announced. As soon as he passes the threshold of the room, Katara sees him get assailed by diplomats and nobles. She would almost pity him, if they had been in friendlier terms.

“So, would you like to dance?” Kuzon asks her.

“Sure.” She lays down her empty glass on a nearby table and takes his hand, leading him to the center of the floor.

Kuzon’s hands are warm and firm on her waist, and as they start to sway he immediately strikes a conversation with her about the ballroom’s ornaments. Katara has to focus on her answers because she feels the burning gaze of Zuko following them as they dance. Several times Kuzon makes her turn, only for her attention to fall on the Fire Lord, talking with dignitaries but not taking his eyes off of her.

They dance for what feels like hours but Katara knows it only has been a few songs. She mutters an excuse about painful shoes and hobbles off to the side, where Iroh is sitting down and sipping at his wine. She likes Kuzon’s company, but she can’t take Zuko’s scathing looks from the other side of the dance floor anymore.

“Iroh, hi,” Katara says loudly, plopping down in a chair next to him.

“Hello dear, are you having fun?” Iroh pours her a glass of wine and she nods in thanks.

“Yes, but I think you did too good a job on the decorations. My date hasn’t stopped ogling the chandeliers yet,” she laughs.

“How could he set his eyes on anything other than you, when you look so ravishing?” Iroh’s words bring heat to her cheeks, and she punches his shoulder lightly. “My nephew was right in choosing sapphire for your hairpins, it goes gorgeously with your dress,” the old man remarks.

“My hairpins – These?” Katara gestures to the top of her head. “Zuko had them made? I found them in my vanity, I didn’t know it was a gift from him.”

Whatever Iroh says next is lost on Katara, as she rethinks of Zuko’s behavior the night he was in her bedroom. Maybe he wanted to give the hairpins to her then, but she sent him away first... Whatever, she is still mad at him.

But the hairpins sure _are_ beautiful… It would be improper not to thank him for the gift, after all.

“I’m sorry, I have to go,” she says abruptly. Iroh only looks at her knowingly, a smile playing on his lips, as Katara gets up and starts walking around the room to find Zuko.

It is not long before she spots him on a balcony, hiding poorly behind glass doors.

“Hi.” She slides beside him, leaning on the balcony railing. The night is cool and she can feel a light breeze playing with her long sleeves.

“Hi.” For all the looks he sent her earlier, this time he barely acknowledges her, looking over the gardens below them.

“I wanted to say thanks, for the hairpins. I didn’t know they were from you.”

“It’s nothing. I just –” He turns towards her and glances at the ornaments. His hand stretches out as if to touch her hair. “I know you missed the winter solstice at home so I wanted to give you something to… I don’t know, to celebrate, I guess. They look good on you.”

“Zuko –”

“Katara, there you are! I was looking for you,” Kuzon’s voice interrupts her. The glass doors slide shut behind him and the three of them find themselves standing on the balcony in a bubble of silence, Katara’s hand hovering above the Fire Lord’s arm.

“You should go back to the party,” Zuko says, and turns his back to them.

A nauseating feeling overcomes her, and Katara doesn’t know if she wants to scream or cry first. What is _wrong_ with him? Can’t he talk to her for more than one second before going back to ignoring her?

When he told her of the reason behind his gift, she wanted to hug him, to thank him, to cry because she would have never thought anybody would do such a kind gesture for her. Now all she wants is to hit him until he stops being so damn distant.

Instead, she takes a deep, calming breath, turns to Kuzon and smiles. She grabs his arm and together they go back inside, leaving the brooding Fire Lord alone.

Ordinarily, Katara just knows she would have never let the matter drop this easily; she would have fought him on this very balcony until he told her what’s wrong, and she would have yelled at him for treating her this way without any explanation. But Kuzon is nice; he is here, present, and he doesn’t deserve her going off on a moody rampage right now.

No, her rampage can wait until after the party.

“So, I was wondering,” Kuzon interrupts her thoughts as they sit down around a small table. “You and the Fire Lord seem… Close.” He eyes her carefully, pouring them two glasses of wine.

Katara’s heart start racing, but her voice is calm when she says, “We are. We’ve been friends since the war.”

“But you’re not… Together, or anything, right?”

As much as Katara feels heat creeping up her face, she keeps her composure and acts nonchalant by putting on a convincing – she hopes – smile. “No, not at all, we’re just friends.”

Why do these words feel like a lie?

“Oh, good.” Kuzon sighs and passes a hand in his dark hair. “I have been wanting to ask you out for a while.”

Katara hears the sliding glass doors open and shut behind her, and feels Zuko’s eyes burn a hole through the back of her head. “Then ask me out,” she says.

******

Two days after the party, Kuzon takes her to a small restaurant by the seaside. The view is lovely, the food is delicious and the company is nice. Katara doesn’t feel any spark with him, but she reassures herself by thinking that she didn’t feel one with Aang either, at first, and it didn’t keep her from dating him for a year.

She ignores the small voice in her head – that sounds suspiciously like Zuko – that tells her that one year of dating isn’t that long.

After they finish their meals, Kuzon takes her by the hand and they go for a walk on the pier, enjoying the afternoon sun and the waves. The conversation flows easily and she finds herself laughing more in a few hours than she did in the last few weeks combined. But of course, like all good things in Katara’s life, their date gets suddenly interrupted by a running messenger.

“Master Katara,” he pants as he holds out a rolled out letter bearing the Fire Lord’s seal. “Fire Lord Zuko requests your presence in his office at this instant.”

Katara opens the letter, hands trembling. What could be so urgent that Zuko would send for her in the middle of her date? Is there a problem? An attack? Something to do with her family? With Aang? Did someone discover something about their secret identities? She can only speculate widely as she reads Zuko’s succinct words.

_Katara,_

_Come to my study as soon as you get this, I have urgent matters to discuss with you,_

_Z._

As she excuses herself to Kuzon and follows the messenger back to the palace, she can’t help but bristle internally. Couldn’t Zuko have put more information in his missive? What use is it to send a letter along with a messenger, if they both say the same thing? But she knows she is only seething because it keeps her worry at bay.

After what feels like the longest trek through town, she finds herself in front of his door. She barely has the time to knock when the panel opens abruptly, Zuko standing right in front of her, seeming perfectly fine.

“Katara, hi. Come in. Would you like some tea?” He gestures to the low table in the center of his study.

“Zuko, what is it? What happened?” She is still clenching the message, stepping in the room slowly. Zuko doesn’t answer, instead sitting down and pouring two cups of tea, so Katara’s voice rises up an octave. “ _Zuko._ What is going on?”

The tips of his ears are reddening, he is fidgeting with the teapot, and Katara starts to put two and two together. _He didn’t. He wouldn’t. Would he?_

“I… Wanted to have tea? With you?”

The teacup closest to Katara explodes when she freezes the tea over.

“You _what?”_ The liquid in the cups is ice cold, but all she feels is a burning anger. “Let me get this straight. You interrupted _my date_ , made me _run here_ , had me _worrying to death_ , all of that for… What? _Nothing?!_ ”

“I wanted to talk to you.” He is infuriatingly calm, and it makes her clench her teeth in rage. “We haven’t spoken in _weeks,_ Katara, and I –”

“ _And whose fault is that?!_ ” She practically yells. “You’ve been ignoring me for days. When I think you’re going to talk to me normally again, you go back to being distant in the next second; why is it so complicated to be your friend?”

Zuko winces, closing his eyes at her accusations. He tries to talk, but she is not done with her piece. The rampage she promised herself at the party has just begun.

“You send a messenger with a _fucking cryptic letter_ and you expect me to stroll in here and have _tea with you?! What in Tui’s name is wrong with you?!_ Did you think making me worry and run through the entire city was going to make me happy? Is there actually an important subject you wanted to discuss, or is all of this just you trying to prove you can mess with my personal life whenever you please?”

“I wasn’t trying to –”

“Please, you’ve been a pain to deal with since the hospital, I can’t believe…” Katara trails off, a light switching on in her brain. No, not since the hospital. Since he met Kuzon. _That can’t be it. He wouldn’t be this petty._

But one look at Zuko’s contrite look, the way he can barely meet her eyes, the way he plays with his thumbs, and she knows she is right.

“You’re jealous.” It is not a question, she just knows it. Spirits, how did she not see it sooner?

The redness in Zuko’s ears crawls to his cheeks. “I’m so sorry for the messenger, and interrupting your date. I messed up, I know that. I just… I know I pushed you away, and when I heard you were going out with Kuzon today, I don’t know, I just – I just panicked.”

Katara can find nothing to say to that. Her heart is racing, her hands are trembling, and she doesn’t know if it has anything to do with her indignation or with the new information about Zuko’s… What? Feelings? Does he have feelings for her?

“Spirits, Zuko. I… I can’t do this. I have to go.” She starts to get up, panic enveloping her.

“Katara, please – Please don’t go. We can talk about this.” He grabs her hand and the familiar shock of electricity running through her arm at his touch makes tears fall from her eyes. “Fuck – Don’t cry, I’m so sorry, Katara,” he says, desperation creeping up in his voice.

She feels him tugging on her hand but she pulls stronger and steps back several paces. “I don’t know how to feel about all this,” she murmurs.

She doesn’t know how to process Zuko’s jealousy. Piling it up with her anger and her worry over a non-existent danger isn’t helping at all.

Katara feels like she is being choked, and the last few weeks catch up with her. The hot and cold of their relationship. The way he ignored her. The stress of not knowing how to talk to her closest friend. She just feels… Unwelcome. And has felt this way for a while, now. Suddenly she understands Aang’s way better than ever: fleeing is so much easier, and she hates herself for it. But she doesn’t have the strength for all of this right now. She needs to not be here: to be somewhere familiar, or somewhere where people will need her, maybe. So she does what her ex-boyfriend would have done, and runs away.

Not one hour later, all of her stuff is packed, she has a note sent to the school and to Kuzon, and she is on her way to the docks in the hope of finding a boat leaving the capital.

It is only when she is at sea that she realizes she forgot her sapphire hairpins in her room.

******

Katara travels for two months. At first she wanders the Fire Nation and goes to small towns to offer her help, not even as the Painted Lady but as herself. Then she finds a ship willing to take her to the Earth Kingdom in exchange of services – cooking, mending clothes, healing, fending off a storm with her waterbending, nothing unusual. She gradually moves south, until hitting Kyoshi Island, where she stays with Suki for a few days. The warrior informs her that her brother is back in the South Pole for now, preparing the tribe for the next spring summit in Ba Sing Se; so Katara borrows one of their dinghies and waterbends herself back home.

When she disembarks in the new Southern Water Tribe harbor, all anger has finally left her, leaving her only confused, a little sad, and regretful of the way she handled the situation. Or didn’t handle. At all.

What she finds at home is what she expected: warm hugs from her father, from Sokka and from Gran Gran, the smell of a stew slowly cooking over the fire, the feel of furs under her feet when she finally takes off her worn down boots, incessant questioning about her travels and _Why didn’t you write more?_

What she finds in her bedroom, though, is something she did not expect. A neat pack of letters, piled up on her bed, all bearing the Fire Nation seal she has come to know and love.

“They’ve been coming every few days,” Sokka tells her, leaning against the threshold of her door. “I think Zuko won some sort of record, maybe in speed letter-writing.”

Katara’s laugh is stuck in her throat, and Sokka shoots her a look that says that, despite his jokes, he understands some of what is happening in his little sister’s life. He steps away when she sits on her bed, taking the first of the letters in her trembling hands.

“Well I’ll leave you to it. Lots of reading material for tonight. I’ll be in my room if you… Yeah. Have a good night, Katara.”

Sokka’s words sound far away as she tears open the first envelope.

_Dear Katara,_

_I’m so sorry about how I handled things. I’m so sorry you felt like you had to leave the palace. I’m so sorry I made things weird between us, sorry I avoided you, sorry I was a stupid, jealous, bad friend. Wow, lots of things to be sorry for, right?_

_Spirits, I don’t want to talk about all of this in a letter. It would be so much easier if you were here, with me, but then again I tend to say stupid things when you’re around._

_When you were here, living ~~with me~~ at the palace… I never felt so happy. I thought I was okay living alone (well as alone as one can be when one is surrounded by guards and maids) but you proved me wrong – kind of a bad habit of yours. The point is, you just left and I already miss you like crazy._

_When you get this, write back to me. Please? At least so I know you’re alright?_

_Your friend ~~I hope~~ ,_

_Zuko._

_-_

_Dear Katara,_

_I waited two days after sending out the first letter before realizing that, maybe, you wouldn’t be home to receive it. Never mind, I’ll continue sending letters until you reply, or until I see you again._

_I know this sounds like some kind of threat, but I don’t know how to say that without it looking bad. It’s not a threat, it’s a promise. I will see you again. And I will apologize again._

_For now, I can only write it; I’m sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry._

_And I hope you’re alright, wherever you are._

_Zuko._

_-_

_Dear Katara,_

_The trade summit is soon and I can’t help but think back to the last time we were there. Only you can turn an event as boring as a political gathering into something I look fondly back on._

_I hope you’ll be there at the next one. I hope we’ll get to talk. And I hope you see these letters before, so you can see how truly desperate I am. I find myself reaching for paper and quill, starting a letter to you, every time I have a spare minute. How pathetic is that? But I don’t care._

_I miss going out at night with you._

_Zuko._

_-_

_Katara,_

_It’s the fourth letter I send and I’m not sure you’ll ever reply._

_I don’t want our friendship to end like that, I feel like such a ~~fucking~~ idiot for having messed this up._

_Please respond?_

_Zuko._

_-_

_Katara,_

_I went out as the Blue Spirit last night. It was not as rewarding as when I did it with you._

_I miss you._

_Zuko._

_-_

_Katara,_

_I think you may have gathered by now, but I won’t stop writing. I’m scared about your lack of response, but if you’re ignoring my letters on purpose, at least send this one back with a scribble, a mark, a signature, anything so I know you’re okay?_

_I might write to Sokka so he’ll tell me if you’re in the South Pole with him. I hope he’s there, too._

_I’m just worried._

_Zuko._

_-_

_Katara,_

_At the palace we are preparing for the trade summit, and I still carry the hope that I’ll see you in Ba Sing Se. Maybe then I’ll get to tell you ~~that I lo~~ how sorry I am in person._

_It’s been almost two months since you left. Sokka told me you’re not home._

_Where are you?_

_Zuko._

_-_

_Katara,_

_Screw it, might as well just say it._

_I love you._

_Please write back._

_Zuko._

Katara is fully crying when she lays down the last letter on her bed. Damn it. Why does this idiot have to make it so hard to stay mad at him?

She can’t help but read and reread the last missive, and her heart swells in her chest every time. When her eyes have memorized the curve in his Ls and the loops of his Ys, she wipes her tears and starts packing for Ba Sing Se.

******

The whole trip there, Katara is so nervous that she almost vomits twice over the ship’s railing. And she would have, readily, but she doesn’t want to attract attention on herself and what screams ‘suspicious’ more than a seasick waterbender?

She can’t wait to see Zuko. And at the same time, she wants to jump ship and swim far away to never see him again. Sokka leaves her alone, mostly, and Katara thinks he guessed at least some part of what is happening between her and the Fire Lord. She would’ve bet that he would have been the first to tease her about all of this, but weirdly enough, he respects her space. Maybe it is because she has a murderous look on her face due to all the stress. Katara doesn’t doubt that her brother will not miss an opportunity to tease her and Zuko if they manage to work things out.

If they manage to work things out… Katara still doesn’t know what to do once she sees him. What do you say to your closest friend after he told you he loved you in a letter?

_I love you too,_ the voice in her head tells her. And like every time she thinks about that, her heart races so fast that she feels like fainting might be a good option.

All in all, Katara feels ridiculous. And apprehensive, because she hasn’t answered to any of his letters – she knows Zuko’s ship probably left the Fire Nation by the time she came home and found his missives. What if he’s changed his mind? What if he wants nothing to do with her because she didn’t give him any news in months? What if he has already moved on, what if he never even loved her in the first place, and all of this is a fluke?

All of these questions swim in her head for days, until she crosses the threshold of the Earth King’s palace’s grand ballroom, and her eyes meet Zuko’s. Suddenly her mind is blank, and she is thankful for it, because she can’t afford to keep having her little mental breakdown in front of him.

His golden eyes widen when they take her in, and Katara is glad she listened to Suki and got a new dress – it is light green and gold, this time, to honor the country they’re in.

She’s rooted in one spot and can’t seem to move. Her father mutters something about going to say hello to some people she doesn’t know – or doesn’t care to know – and her brother makes a bee line for the food. On the other side on the room, Zuko raises a hand lightly and gives her a tentative smile. She feels herself reciprocating the gesture and Zuko’s smile widen until it lightens his entire face.

In a few long strides, they meet in the middle of the dance floor, and Katara thinks back to the last time they were here, the last time they crossed this very room. He stands before her and takes her hands in his.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” she feels her lips stretch into a huge grin and suddenly she doesn’t remember what she was so nervous about in the first place.

“I’m –”

“Sorry, I know. I got your letters.” She squeezes his hands.

“You did?” His eyes are comically round, which doesn’t help her get serious. “But you never…”

“I came home well after your last letter. I figured you were already leaving for Ba Sing Se so I couldn’t write you back.”

Zuko looks pensive, but she can see the tips of his ears redden significantly when she mentions his last letter. “Good. That’s… Good. I hoped it was the case, but I couldn’t stop writing. I –”

“Would you like to dance?” Katara interrupts him, looking around her at all the couples in the center of the ballroom.

“Yes please.” He smiles once more and puts one hand on her waist, the other holding her own. A memory of another dance, with another man, in another country, flashes to Katara’s mind. She shakes it off. This is now, and this is Zuko.

His hands are warm, and soft despite the calluses, and she can’t tear her eyes away from his.

After a few minutes of them dancing together in silence, Zuko clears his throat and says, “You look absolutely amazing, Katara.” Her cheeks burn, and he averts his eyes when he tells her, “I wanted to tell you how beautiful you looked last time, too. At the new year party. You were so pretty with the hairpins I had made for you.”

“I think I forgot the hairpins in my bedroom,” she says apologetically.

“I’ll mail them to you. Or you can come get them, whatever you want. I don’t want you to ever feel obligated to come see me.”

Katara can tell he feels badly and doesn’t want to turn the mood sour. She’s not angry with him anymore, and she wants them to move past that. So she squeezes his hand and touch his chin so he can look at her again. “This was then. This is now. You don’t need to apologize again, you did it enough in your letters, Zuko.”

She’s drowning in golden eyes, but she sees him blush nonetheless at her words. “About my letters…”

“Did you mean it?” She has to know. She can’t give him an answer if he isn’t sure of what he feels.

“Every word. Katara, I –”

“I love you.” And like that, it’s so easy, it pours out of her without prompting. And it feels good.

Zuko smiles softly and blinks hard, and she mimics his gesture because she too feels tears build up in her eyes. “I’m so in love with you, Katara.”

He puts his forehead on hers and they breathe each other in for a minute, eyes closed.

They’re in the middle of a crowd of dignitaries, nobles, kings, parents, brothers, friends, so Katara doesn’t kiss him. Instead, she circles his shoulders with her arms, and he tightens his hold on her, a hand on her lower back and the other in her hair.

When her face is pressed against his chest and he is breathing in the crook of her neck, when they’re swaying slowly to the rhythm of the music, when she tells him that she’ll go to the Fire Nation with him if he asks, she remembers _The Painted Lady and Blue Spirit’s parting gifts_ and thinks that, maybe, being in love with Zuko isn’t such a ridiculous notion.


End file.
